Destiny Disturbed
by Andrea Foxx
Summary: All it takes is one altered action, one sacrifice made, one tiny change in fate to remake a legend. OOT AU
1. Prologue

_"You will relent in the end, tree," said the dark man, horrid energy crackling around his fists. "You will not stand in my way."_

And yet the tree resisted, boughs rustling as if the great storm of hellish design was nothing more than wind through its leaves. The wood-guardian's power ran deep through vast roots and the ancient spirit steadied itself upon a foundation of ages to weather the blast.

"That may be so, Evil One," it said, voice creaking from every sprout, every branch. "But I have seen a future of this world, and I will do all in my power to prevent it. Even if it means disturbing that future's destiny."

"Enough! I will have the spiritual stone!" the man said, thunder booming his words. "Relinquish it and you may yet see another sunrise!"

Still the tree endured as a pillar of resilience amidst the howling wind. The brush surrounding the clearing had been flattened, the grass had been ripped to shreds.

It spoke, and the earth rumbled. "I would let go of every sunrise for eternity before giving you the spiritual stone, Evil One!" The crack of limbs almost outshrieked the lightning. "You are not destined to keep it! Do your worst! "

The man's laugh was darker than his power. "Gladly!"

And the curse was complete. The great tree's leaves began to wither, shrivel, as if doused in acid salt. The bark cracked, shivered apart. And even when the dark bloody wood within showed, the tree stood firm.

And a root pierced the man's back. His woven net of magic shattered, the darkness dispelled, and he was left to look up at the wilting tree under the stars: cold night taking them both.

"Your destiny does not lie in Death, Evil One. A great power will come to you, whether you take it or not," rasped the tree, strength ebbing. "But may your darkness revel in oblivion, and may your mind know peace."

The clouds broke and cool rain finally poured down from above. And in those few moments before infinity, the man could feel the last of the tree's power pour into him, green and warm. It blurred his thoughts, soothed them, and sent his mind into a potent, hazy euphoria. His darkness hiccuped, screamed, was stifled, and split asunder.

"What virtues would die with me, let them pass to you. May they nourish you as your curse has ravaged this world."

The tree's spirit faded from the mortal realm. And so the man collapsed there under the stormclouds and slept.  



	2. Power

**Part I: Power**

**--**

Waking was like being born. I did not know what it felt like when I woke that first time. The sensation of being awake seemed new to me in a way I could not explain. It should have felt mundane, I knew. I knew I had experienced it hundreds of times before. But I could not directly recall those times, and so I accepted it as a new experience. As I woke, I became aware that I was not a sleeping _thing_, but a man. And I had a body. And that the body rested in a very uncomfortable bed, or so I felt. There was that feeling of rough sheets, of clean cloth, and the smell of a sharp, sweet musk. Was that my scent?

I pulled up sharply in the bed and then made to stand, only to bash my head against the low roof. I was in a very small house made of a massive hollowed-out oak. Light streamed in through a whittled-clear knothole window and onto my face. It was warm, and I decided I liked the feeling of the sun. I did not know how I knew that the light was sunlight, but I accepted it. What I had thought was one bed was in fact several small beds pushed together: my body was much bigger than the room was meant for. From head to feet, I filled it almost clearly from one wall to the other side. Armor lay in a heap in the corner-- my armor. Mine. I had things; that sword and the armor were some of my things.

Having things was satisfying. Being able to call them mine-- my armor, my sword...

"Oh! Please! Don't try to get up! We don't know what's wrong with you yet."

A voice, very young. A girl, with words light like... a songbird, yes. I had heard songbirds before, but they were not native in my mind. I turned to look. It was a tiny girl, hardly older than eleven or twelve. She wore sensible clothes dyed with plant juices and her hair was just as emerald as her pretty eyes.

What was my age, then?

Twenty-eight. Yes, twenty-eight years. Not yet old, even. Funny, I could not recall exactly what I had done for such a long time.

"Who are you?" I asked. Was that my voice? I coughed-- it sounded raspy, and so I tried again. "What is this place?" That was much better: smoother, less jagged. I had a very deep, full voice, and that was good. Powerful. I liked it.

It startled her. Perhaps I had been too loud.

"Forgive me," I tried to reassure her. "I did not mean to frighten you. Please, tell me who you are."

Please. The word felt unfamiliar in my mouth and alien to my tongue, as if I did not say it often. I wondered what that meant as I wrapped my lips around the syllable, trying to liken it to myself. It had an interesting taste that felt weak, soft. Too weak for my liking, but the flavor was sweet.

"I'm Saria," she said shyly, setting a water jug down by the tiny table that had been pushed into the opposite corner. It took two hands for her to carry it at all.

"That is quite a pretty name," I admitted, though I couldn't for the life of me understand why admitting that felt so strange to me. "My name is..."

I could feel my face frown. "Is..."

I could not remember my name. It was not completely gone from my mind, not as if it had evaporated. I groped for it, but it simply danced out of my grasp: just out of reach, somewhere I couldn't touch. I was important, a great and powerful man, I knew. Only, why? Who was I?

"I can't recall," I said. It frustrated me, and I could feel anger. I should have known! My name was important! It was on the tip of my tongue, I could feel it, but every time it recoiled away from retrieval.

"Don't make that mad face, mister. It makes you look scary," Saria said to me. "Really, it's okay. You'll just have to figure it out. It can't be too hard, can it?"

I doubted it, but the wisdom in her words was obvious. There was no point in becoming upset about things I could not change. She was right. If I could not remember my name, I would have to do without for the time being. No matter who I happened to be, I was myself. That was good enough for the moment.

"May I get up, Saria? This is uncomfortable."

"Sorry," she apologized. "We don't have any beds big enough for you... okay, I guess you can sit up."

She fetched a seat from the mess of things by the far wall and sat with me. I had to hunch over in the tight room, but the knot in my back slowly began to relax. "I thank you for your hospitality, little one," I said, for she truly was very small in my eyes. "Where am I?"

"You're in our village," she explained. I was mesmerized with the russet fairy that had taken flight from underneath her hair. "We're the kokiri, and we live in the forest with the Great Deku Tree..."

Her words trailed off, warbling until they faded away entirely. And she looked... sad. Immediately, my own thoughts confused me. A very large part of me did not care in the least how she felt or if she frowned. But there was a new part... I cannot explain it. As if I was budding a fresh branch, there was life _thriving_ in me, young and full of vitality. Something sown in me had germinated, like my insides were a plant and I had turned to face the sun. This green, growing part of me, it did think of frowns and cares.

"What?" I asked, careful to master my own voice. "What troubles you?"

"The Deku Tree. He's... dead," she said. I could tell she was losing control of her emotions. "The Deku Tree died..."

"I'm sorry."

I said it far too quickly for a man who barely knew what this Deku Tree was. Did I mean it? The oldest part of me did not, callous and cruel. The new part did not know what had happened at all. But in the bottom of me, for some reason, I was sorry. Guilty.

I didn't understand at the time. The idea of being sorry for anything was so foreign I didn't know what it even felt like until that moment. And the idea of apologizing was even more outlandish, even so much as to monetarily anger me. My core had forced the words up through my lips before I had even thought to restrain them. They were like a released breath.

When my thoughts returned to the waking world, Saria was crying. I didn't know what to think of the sound. The dichotomy raged in me, apathy predominant. But I knew an urge: strange and powerfully compelling. Magnetic. I did not even know what I was doing. My arms moved clumsily without me, had reached out; in an instant she was against my breast and she did not scream or struggle. She only wept and seized my doublet to sob into it.

"The Deku Tree was a father to me," she whispered. "To all of my friends."

Father. The word struck me very suddenly. For a moment I thought I remembered but then it was all gone again. But that word...?

Was I a father?

Yes. That was part of who I was. Somewhere, somewhere in the world, my daughters were waiting for me. And my sisters-- I had those, too.

I could almost scream, for that was all I was able to remember for the moment. Instead, I just grasped the young girl closer and held her there. The act was almost spiritual, indulging some visceral part of my design: deeply masculine. She was so small. It did not matter if she was not mine. She had lost her own, and the remnants of my base nature ached to express themselves. I was a father. That was who I was.

"Thank you, mister," she said to me. "I don't know what's the matter with me... I shouldn't be such a baby..."

I let her go, somehow intensely satisfied except for the huge apathetic blight in me, which was merely disgusted. She wiped the tears away, mumbling apologies and sniffling until she could speak surely again.

"We found you lying there by his roots," she said quietly. "He had been dead all night. Do you remember..."

I couldn't. "No."

"Oh." She fidgeted. "Okay then. Well, how do you feel?"

I thought.

"Well," I said. "Odd. But very well."

I couldn't remember what I was comparing myself to, but what I said felt very true. The more I thought, the better I felt. A weight had been removed from my shoulders. I breathed easily, my chest swelled with air, I felt it to be deep. Blood ran like fire-oil through me, my pulse drummed steady and slow. And I had strong flesh, all wire and muscle. I realized just what sort of body I had. If I wanted to I could have cracked a hole in the wall effortlessly. And the green, fresh bud in my soul only channeled life.

Saria smiled. "That's good! You were asleep for a long time. We were worried you were really hurt," she said. "When you get hungry, you can go outside and ask somebody to find me. I'm going to tell everybody the good news."

I did not tell her that I also felt hollow, in a way. As if I was only half-there, although the remaining parts of me were working surely to patch the gaping rent and that I was quickly feeling less so. My mind was oddly empty, with only a dull ache left where a massive _something_ used to be. I cannot decide if it felt like a hole had been blown in my breast with blasting-powder, or if a cancer had been forcibly sliced out of me. It was fascinating how quickly the soul works, though. Rapid-fire thoughts filled the void, echoing across blank space, and I could feel the pressure of new growth pushing against the edges of the hollow, roots snaking across and bridging some bizarre spiritual gap. Growing in it, filling it, quickly building me whole again.

I can hardly describe it, so I will not attempt to any longer. Saria got up from where she sat cross-legged on the floor, and gathered a small bag as if she expected to forage herbs or retrieve trapped game.

"Who is everybody?" I asked.

"All of my friends, the kokiri," she said. "We all carried you to my house."

"Oh. Thank you."

"There's a mirror I found on the wall over there, and there's water if you need a drink. When you're up to it, I can introduce you to everybody."

She opened the sheet that was the door and left, leaving me alone. Slowly, I got up from the bed, waiting for any sudden pain or ache from a wound. There was none, which was strange because I distinctly could recall a sharp puncture in my back not long ago. And a transcendental experience, a passing of strength, from something else into me-- an ancient presence reaving my own, injecting something like a wasp's poison sting. Only not poison, something wooly and soothing that enriched... and then as if I had sheared apart under stress or exploded from pressure.

I came back to bear and found I could not remember what had happened at all. I had to stoop low to move in the very small house, but I managed well enough to maneuver over to the wall with the big jagged shard of plate mirror.

Because I knew mirrors reflected only what they saw, the face I met was surely my own. I reached and felt the shape, the line of the jaw. Not bad. My skin was sun-dark and smooth, and I wore a diadem on my brow. My hair was thick and very red, but had receded prematurely. Curiously, there were places where it was beginning to creep forward again.

Hm. I had a rather large nose. There was no accounting for small flaws, I supposed.

My eyes were very sharp and yellow like an eagle's. I made an ugly face and found it to be quite terrible. Several minutes passed as I stood in front of the mirror, trying different faces one after another. I could not find one I liked.

Stooping down was giving me a massive crick in my spine. I had to stand up straight, which meant going outside. I made to leave, but stopped.

I felt naked. My sword. I needed my sword. I took it from where it leaned against the wall and belted it on. The weight comforted me. I was a warrior, I learned. The sword was one of my greatest strengths.

I left my armor behind. Surely, I did not need it amongst children.

–

I had been wrong.

The kokiri children had been thrown into a panic; monsters appeared within their borders, driving all but the bravest to the safety of their homes. The monsters should _not_ have been attacking me. I knew that without knowing why. Their feeble efforts were easy to ignore, however-- I did not have to draw my sword at all to simply scare them away from the fleeing children.

I searched house after house for Saria. No luck. She was gone.

This was how I met Link.

Standing at my full height, I knew how much bigger I was compared to the kokiri children. Link barely reached my waist. He was a hardy lad, with determined blue eyes and yellow hair stuffed into a cap. For protection he carried a wooden shield and a bright silver shortsword that was only a dagger to me. If he had not been so serious about playing soldier I would have mocked him. But as it was he cared only to keep safe his best and only friend. He traveled with a bright white fairy that he said had been given to him the night before the Deku Tree died. If it was true or not, the fairy did not speak to me. He shot down keese with a slingshot-- at the very least, he was brave for a lad and had ingenuity on his side.

I had no sons, but I decided he was tolerable. Perhaps likeable.

"Saria went to the forest temple to calm the spirits," he said to me. "I've got to help her-- she has all these magic tricks but she's not any good against monsters. She needs a sword; she'll be hurt if she's all alone."

He sounded unnaturally mature to me. It was in a way refreshing; for some reason all I could recall of most other people I had known in my lifetime was that many of them were fools.

We were stopped by one such little idiot by the name of Mido. He accused me of murder and attempted to stand in my way, to deny me entrance to the Lost Woods. I was completely prepared to sweep him aside, but to my surprise Link defended me as a friend of Saria.

That touched me. It was amusing to see someone else kick the idiot in the shins for me.

Finally, after following the boy through a labyrinth of trees, we entered the Sacred Grove. I should not have been so surprised at Link's prowess: more formidable than most grown men. There were no adults among the kokiri, thus the responsibility for the tribe's safety fell upon children. In a sense, that was distinctly disturbing.

"Saria!"

Saria did hear him; she stood on the top of the broken stairs resolutely, just about to turn inside to enter. She snapped about to look at Link and at me and she smiled, waved to us in relief.

I yelled at her, tried to warn her of the shadow behind her in the door. Link shouted as well. But it was too late. Phantom limbs snatched her and sucked her, screaming, inside. The temple looked hungry and she was the prey.

My heart seized up like it had been myself that had been taken; the blood rushed through my ears with a deafening sound. Strong instincts burned in my limbs: an overpowering paternal response written into me. "Quickly!" I heard myself boom and I tossed the boy, for he had no way to climb the broken stairs. He landed, shouting, but safely and vanished after his friend in an instant.

I grasped something reflexively, complex patterns and figures exploding behind my eyelids as my mind sped to harness them. I didn't know what spell I cast, only that it was so practiced that I channeled it automatically. I did not blink, but I was on the ledge even though I hadn't moved a step.

I was a master of magic.

The wide-open doors were no obstacle for me. I blew through them and entered the main foyer without a second thought. Link was there, stabbing his short blade again and again into a black mass-- his tenacity was amazing, but I hardly thought of it.

Saria was struggling against the dark flames, wildly clinging to a balcony. There was a great vortex, a mass of crushing consumption that threatened to pull her in.

I would have none of it. I blasted it with my own intuitive magic (practice or brilliance, I could not say at the time) and it let go of Saria, but not in pain. In surprise, I felt. The scene was a blur to me- I caught her, held her, and placed her out of the way by the boy.

"Defend her," I said. And I drew my sword for the first time that day.

The weight of it in my hand was intimate, whispering of memories and long hours with it by my side. My muscles knew the blade well, my limbs knew the movement. Combined with the desperate protective drive and a strong lust for revenge, the appeal of battle was intoxicating. Nothing would have pleased me more than the sound of bones cracking, the high pitch of a death scream, to feel the resistance of my blade through the flesh it shred apart.

I met none of these as I swung, but a sick oily clamminess like trickling sour sweat and slimy decay.

Worst of all, it felt like _me._ As it slithered formlessly, I could feel that it fit into the hollow in my heart, the empty void in my mind. Well, not entirely. The edges had shrank and changed shape as I felt myself repair, rework, and it no longer could compress itself into the space anymore.

"What is your business here?!" I demanded of it. "What are you?!"

To my complete horror, it spoke. Not in a voice, nothing so organized as words-- merely scattered thoughts, a direct contact with my mind that felt as if it was not separate from me at all. If it had a voice, the voice would have been my own.

I am me the you that is this hatred spread by a curse and forced out by a blessing the you that must exist and does exist an aspect of the whole separate but the same you the inner you from your black soul the monster you will become your madness one day you will be consumed with the beast that you truly are in this lifetime in all lifetimes the echo of your fate changed I am the you that you avoided your destiny disturbed and yet still I must exist for it is fate the cycle begins now you must start it even if I must not be you to do so

Memory stung my inner eye. It (I?) did not speak of evil exactly, but of might and want and dominance and everything that was sinister when viewed at a distance. I was... an evil man?

The bloodthirst made sense. The startling apathy for the well-being of others. The streak of pleasure at dark thoughts, the hungry satisfaction in _owning_, in _having_, in _mine_.

I struck at it (me?) again and again. No, I protested. In the short experience I had tasted thus far in oblivion, I could not have been so terrible. It had not yet been a full day, and I did not wish to lose the peace I felt. For the first time in an eternity I felt truly free, felt clean. I was a father, I did feel deeply, and in my life I had taken the time to master the arts of war and sorcery not entirely for vicious ends. I knew unfamiliar guilt-- if this grossness was all I was, remorse should not have been possible.

The tree, I remembered. I was recalling quickly. The tree infected me with... cursed me as I cursed it, no, not cursed. I blighted it... it did the opposite to me, and made me forget pain. As I fought I could feel memories in my head speeding, connecting, bursting into constellations of thought. Clarity was returning to me profoundly. The new growth in my soul was a direct action of the tree. It had done... something. It had taken its remaining goodness, the wholesomeness it yet harbored, and had given it to me freely. Sowed me with what grace it had left in death.

If I had wanted to reject it, it was too late to wither it. The once-vestigial sprouting had exploded into overgrowth, burgeoned forth: prolific and unstoppable. It was a part of me now. This final gift of valor and compassion had driven this sinister black presence out of me. In return for my curse, the tree had changed my fate. My actions, my motivations and my compulsions, had been altered.

And, strangely, I did not feel manipulated. But again, that crushing ruefulness that I so hated. I hated it. I hated me.

For _I_ was the murderer of the Deku Tree. Saria's tears flashed through my mind and the reason for my guilt became plain to me. And I found there was a murderous rage that still dwelt in my soul. It filled my sword and I thrust it deep into the snarl that was me.

Because I remembered everything, my life spiraling before my eyes in reverse. Of course there was hate in me. My people suffered and I had become so desperate as to seek the King's favor in wake of the unifying war. I had fallen out of approval with my own people; although they still obeyed me my cruelty insulted their honor as noble thieves. I knew of the Triforce, the blessing of Hyrule that I could not touch. And I craved it; wanted it for my own. Ever desiring more. My people were only an excuse. It was not out of need I sought power. It was pure, unrefined lust. The Triforce was irresistible.

This..._thing_ was but a manifestation of the lengths I would go to seize it-- the depths of atrocity that lay dormant inside me, waiting for a time to wake and consume me. And I found I no longer had an appetite for such dishonor, such foulness.

My name was-- is Ganondorf. And I would have ruled the world.

It did shriek this time, but in amusement. My blow barely scratched it, though it recoiled.

I am irredeemable yet I persist I must take it it should be mine it will be mine this world will be mine and if this host no longer serves me I will find another, it said. And the dark smoke it was-I was--- rose into the air, seeped through the cracks and was gone.

Loosed upon the world. I was free to wreak havoc as I pleased. It should not have terrified me as much as it did. I did not like losing control. I never have liked to lose control. And what this was... it was a vital loss of control. I could no longer control myself. This part of me that was free was, dubbed by the regrowth in my heart, _evil_.

No longer was it serving purpose. No longer did it care for my people, even if only in name as an excuse. It did not wish to give my Gerudo what prosperity they deserved. It simply desired. Wanted. Hungered.

I decided I would not let myself do this.

"A... amazing."

Saria was speaking behind me.

"That was... wow! You're really strong!"

Considering I had been the one to take her father away, the words were hardly as sweet as they could have been. It was only when I went to sheathe my sword did I realize that in my hands I held something else.

A stone, mounted in lustrous gold. It sparkled green in the dim light-- the Forest's Emerald. The presence, the me, had curled around it and had been using it to corrupt the forest. It had been ripped from the Deku Tree. One of the keys to the Sacred Realm, entrusted to the greatest guardian of living things. I needed it to reach the Triforce.

I could feel the thirst for the golden power rise within me. But I recognized it now, and pushed it away with all of my mental strength. I would not let the demon-shade claim what was rightfully mine. Acting with greed and selfishness would only play into its (my own?) hands.

"Boy! You must take this!" I ordered, giving the stone to him. "Listen closely. Both of you. This is very important."

Link, the youth, accepted it in confusion. "You remember, don't you?"

"Yes," I said. "You must pay attention now. Forget nothing. I am Ganondorf, and I am the King of the Gerudo."

And I told him of the darkness, how it had slain the Deku Tree, and how it had been born from my anger and how it once had seized me as its host. That way, Saria did needed not resent me: she could resent the interloping shadow instead. I ordered Link to take the sacred stone to the castle to the north, where he would meet me again to further act. I would have taken it myself, I told him, but the spirit once had been me and could predict my path and actions to the letter. It did not know his mind in the way it knew mine.

Saria, I ordered, would stay and care for the forest. The Deku Tree was gone and the kokiri needed a competent leader in the stead of that Mido idiot, and a good healer besides. I suggested she take up marksmanship or stave-work, for the world would become unsafe for practically everyone very quickly, if I knew myself.

Link refuted me and told me that outside the forest kokiri would die. I told him that the Deku Tree's blessing of immortality was gone anyways and that he was a special case.

I hadn't the mind to tell him he was not a kokiri. It was obvious to everybody but himself. Perhaps he also knew, but denied it. It would have been too much for him, too quickly. I was placing my faith in children as it was. There was no sense in over-complicating a simple plan.

I would have to counsel the King of Hyrule as soon as I could. Within two days. Time was wasting, and once I saw that Link understood and was resolute, and that Saria was sure of her part to play, I departed.

In less than a minute, I was outside the forest and off to the castle as fast as my horse could take me. My people were safe for the moment. The me-fiend was not interested in them; it was only interested in the Golden Power and would stay close to it until the Sacred Realm could finally be reached. It was no living being-- the barriers and keys to keep mortals away would do little to deter it once it could pass from host to host. All I could hope was to somehow stall _it_ while gathering the keys myself, reach the Triforce before _it_ did.

I don't know when _it_ first came to be. There was a time where I could recall an original peace in my heart, instead of this troubled resurrected one. The Fierce War changed that, so perhaps Hyrule's own unification started it in me. I had been even younger then, and the conflict was not deemed 'fierce' without reason. But for all of the decay rent from me my mind was, and is, still the tactical mastermind of the Fierce War. Shame that I would have to foil myself, after all the forces I faced already in my still-young life.

However it had been born, I decided that the perversion was not me-- I was me. I was Ganondorf. And while I had once been one with it, committed terrible crimes I could not undo, I could yet repair things even if a little. Warn the Gorons against an entity bearing my face (though too late) and lend Gerudo aid to the dodongo infestation. Usher the Zora to exercise caution and to be wary of the infection in their river god. I could not retake any of the curses I had placed, but I could clear the way for one who could.

Link was an extraordinary boy, I realized. I wondered if I had known him before but of course I did not. What mattered was the air of destiny about him. Surely the tree had given him the fairy companion because it had seen the future, as it had told me. His presence in the forest when he was no kokiri could not be coincidence. And if the tree had faith in the boy's power to break my curses then I would abide by the final wish.

For when all was said and done all that mattered was that he would follow my lead. I was leading children, but I had their faith. And I had started this mess, so I had ought to finish it.

Because although I could remember every scheme I had made, every burning ambition in me, I was a new man. Those ambitions had not died but simply reversed, the drive trained in a new direction by the tree's final strategy. I could feel my transformation deepening by the moment. The Deku Tree had sacrificed both of our lives to change fate-- He had not succeeded, for he did not kill the old me. It lived on both within my heart as a memory and as the shaping of my mind, and in the black madness I had released. But perhaps I could triumph in altering destiny where the wood-guardian had not.

Hooves clattered upon the long road before me. Everything was going to change in Hyrule. And soon.


	3. Wisdom

**Part II: Wisdom.**

**--  
**

33 Din

Ganondorf has been gone an awful long time, more than the two days he claimed to need.  
He must be up to no good. Heavens, the storm's finally clearing. It must have stretched all the way to the forest.

--

34 Din

I have a bad feeling this entry is going to be longer than whole weeks combined.

My dream changed last night. For weeks now I have been having the same one. I've written about it many times, so I will not write about it again. And it was an omen, too. Just like the dream was before. Only something's different. I'll try to remember. It's easier on paper.

The stormclouds were the same, ominous as ever. And lightning cracked in the distance. I was waiting for the light from the forest and the fairy and the Emerald Stone when the dream changed. It went like this:

The wind changed direction, became strong and cool instead of stagnant. But the clouds lingered, forming a kind of funnel over the castle. Issuing from the windows of the towers. And the clouds became smoke, and there was fire, but a quiet fire. Secret. Nobody knew it was there. Just the smoke-clouds overhead gave it away. Then the light from the forest came just like normal.

I looked at a map today and tried to base the change in the dream against geography. The new wind that stood against the stormclouds came from the west. The desert, I'm sure of it.

Diary, it was an omen. I'm so confused. I don't know what to think.

Ganondorf arrived back at the castle from his leave in the negotiations today. Ever since he came weeks ago I've been having the dream like I said before. But today was different. I don't know how to say it. I'll try to describe it and then I can flip back a few entries and compare what I say now to what I already said about him.

I had to appear with my father today to reopen the negotiations. Really, I was like a little perfect political doll. All I was there for was to make it seem like all of the royal family cared, to make Hyrule seem more forgiving than we really are. But in my nicest dress I saw everything.

The moment he burst into the room, I could already notice something strange about him, something different from the many times he had entered the throne room before. He came with no guards this time, and he did not polish his armor. In truth, I would have said he looked a bit disheveled but remarkably it was anything but. Always he's haggard, strained, with a forced neutral expression that makes him look older than maybe he is. Either that or a nasty sneer he makes when he thinks nobody's looking.

Today he seemed tired, as if he had been riding for a long time. But in a lot of ways he looked unexpectedly invigorated, as if he had gotten a good share of sleep. He carried himself differently-- straight, not ramrod, but pulled to his enormous full height with good posture. His steps were confident, fluid, and he wasn't so careful not to clunk his boots on the carpet. He's no longer worried about seeming nonthreatening. I think a few of the other presiding lords in attendance were a bit intimidated by his boldness.

For once he didn't hide his real expressions. He was worried, a little angry, and clearly would take no nonsense from the court. I know he practices dark magic, and I've looked up what horrible things it can do to the body over time. But strangest of all, what traces of damage I've seen on him were faded almost as if he was mending. Some of the uglier creases in his face were gone, sunken angles fleshing smoothly up, and the tight, drawn lips were relaxed and more natural. I fancied I was hallucinating from my tight bodice. He looked strangely healthier, and because of that, also not so old and weathered.

I'd heard stories of people getting struck by lightning and somehow gaining back hearing or sight. But I've never heard of anybody being struck by lightning and undoing years of black magic abuse. It's ridiculous. Maybe if lightning was made up of life-force. But how can anybody be struck by _life?_ What in the world can feed somebody pure, concentrated _growth_?

I thought I was imagining it all until he opened his mouth to speak. His voice was the real sign that something was not at all the same with him. I don't know how everybody else missed it. They didn't notice at all. Ganondorf always spoke in controlled tones to my father: low and restrained and sort of greasy-feeling, like chunks of cold fat mutton stuck in the back of the throat. His words were usually just strong enough to fill father's ears, and those were full of yeses and pandering. And hoarse at that, as if he spent a lot of time roaring and nobody ever heard it anywhere.

But today his voice filled more than father's ears: it filled the entire hall! He wasn't even yelling, but his voice was just... big and deep and full. It was strange to hear my father talk back to that huge, rich voice when_ he_ was usually the one who made the demands. And again, like that man had gotten a good sleep the sandy rasp in his speech had vanished. Maybe his throat got burned from muttering evil words, and somehow it's healed over again as good as new.

When my father sat I got a good look at the awful face. Diary, I wish I hadn't. I like to think I'm good at reading everybody. It sort of happens when you spend all your life watching and never doing. But I don't know what to think anymore.

His eyes were scary, but not in the usual way. They were the same shape. With the same intensity, the same yellow fierce glare-stare. But where they once invoked fear, his eyes falling on me reminded me of something different. Before I had the omens I thought I was going crazy because when he looked around I could sort of feel every little bit of his badness behind the stare. He radiated it. He'd look at us and I would feel 'bad, bad' way deep in me where things just have to be true.

It's the reverse now. I'm scared of him because when he looked upon us today I think my heart stopped for a second. Instead of 'bad, bad,' the voice in my heart said 'good, good.' I almost couldn't look at him because in my head he exhaled good things that were too stark-- he held a fire to my eyes when before he'd been dark. Even though he was the same man. It was too sudden. Instead of my spine freezing as if I was going to be eaten when he looked at me I clenched up with much nicer, more tender things. Like he was coming to watch over us and not to kill us.

Overnight, he stands for the complete opposite of what he had been before. Diary, only days ago he terrified me! I wanted to run away and hide from him. Now I just have this outlandish urge to run up to him and call him uncle or something like that. I suppose my hunches are usually right but I don't know if I should trust myself anymore. It could all be a trick. If I listen to my intuition, he went from malevolent to righteous in one day. One day!

His eyes fell on everybody in the court in turn when he faced us and when he came to me I smiled at him. I didn't know what got into me, Diary. It just came out. It wasn't proper for me to smile at all when his news concerned demons on the loose. His presence was mesmerizing, though, and I couldn't help it. And instead of passing over me like he usually did when he pretended to heed the royal family he really and truly looked at me, right in the eyes.

He smiled back, diary. And not one of his scary hungry grins. It was only a twitch, a brief little ghost of an awkward jerk in the corner of his mouth. As if he was very bad at smiling. But it was one. I could see it, it was there! He really and truly smiled at me!

As if things couldn't get any stranger. I've never seen anybody seem so different before. He's the same man but he feels like a completely separate person. He's changed, just like how the nice strong wind started blowing from the desert in my dream.

But he is really, really good at pretending. Maybe he's just trying harder to seem nice now. Maybe he's just as rotten, deep down inside? But why would he try so hard if nobody was going to notice it? I think I'm the only one who sees something different in him. I don't understand how nobody saw that for the first time ever before the court his words were one hundred percent sincere.

Goodnight, Diary. Tomorrow I'm going to spy on him more and see it it's really true. I can't write anymore tonight. I'm going on and on because I'm just so confused.

I hope I'm not right. I really hope that he has changed. I hope that he's been completely transformed. I hope that whatever happened to him happened really hard and now he's become the best man ever and he sees how awful he was and is guilty over it. It would serve him right. And it would serve my father right for being mean to him. He thinks I don't notice, but I do. Just like about everything else.

Goodnight for real this time.

–

36 Din

Oops. Ganondorf caught me snooping. I think. Maybe he was spying on me at the same time I was spying on him. He's tricky that way. But he didn't make a scene-- he caught me in the library last night after I spent the whole day thinking he wasn't noticing. I snuck out of bed like normal to put back the books I borrowed in secret and he was already there expecting me when nobody else was around. He even kept a fire going just so he could sit with a book and wait.

He had a poetry book. I didn't even know he liked things like books, much less poetry. But he read it in a way that made me feel that it wasn't because he'd had this personality change. It was weird. He was reading it aloud when I ran into him, to himself. Or maybe to me, if he knew I was going to be there. I have to admit it, he has a great voice for war sagas.

He asked me what I had been doing earlier looking through his things and sneaking about like a thief.

Really late at night in the library with no guards around on patrol to save me anyway, it didn't matter if I was polite or rude to him. I told him indelicately to let go of his act because he wasn't fooling me with it and that I knew what he wanted and that I wasn't afraid of him, and at length, that he could go soak his head.

He laughed at that. A startling deep laugh that swelled his chest and twisted his mouth into a smirk. The same frightening sound as before. Diary, it was strange: felt like he was pleased with me, rather than that he was going to hurt me.

He applauded my bluntness and then began to ask about what I was doing in the library anyway. I'm sure he already knew, though. I didn't let him see the titles of my books but I'm sure he guessed they were elementary magic technique. He offered to show me a few tricks but I impolitely said no.

It didn't daunt him. He gave that spontaneous twitch of a bare smile at me again and mocked my caution. I still don't get this strange spiritual metamorphosis. I keep trying to put my finger on it: he acts in the same way as he did before-- on the outside the same, but underneath things are less severely angry. More healthy. Better, like some previously shriveled dead good part of him is flourishing like a weed seed and taking over.

Impa told me earlier, with all of her powers of true sight, that he's not putting up a facade. It confuses her, too. By all rights this all should be really creepy and I should be staying away from him. I hear all sorts of stories in the town about scary men enticing children with sweets and then taking them to sell into slavery in the deep south jungles, but in some weird subversion Ganondorf is just giving me the metaphorical sweets, without a covered wagon to throw me in. I don't get it.

I don't want to believe it, but Ganondorf was being truly and honestly kind. There was a kind of glow in his eyes that I sometimes see in father's. But a lot brighter. Now that I think of it, he talks to me like I was a grown-up and not a child. I wish father would do that, too. Nobody ever believes me when I try to say something important.

Maybe to the Gerudo, being grown-up comes earlier than it does for princesses.

He told me a lot of things. He told me that I was very brave to stand up to him and that I was absolutely right about him and that my mother must have been an excellent woman because I certainly hadn't gotten much from my father. I asked him if he was going to kill me, and he said that would have been a waste for it was difficult to find sensible people these days.

He also asked for my help. I wondered what he was doing asking for my help when he could ask for the King's. He said my father was a blind bigoted donkey rear. To be polite.

I didn't like him insulting my father at all, but I can see where he may have been coming from. Father doesn't trust the Gerudo. The negotiations were only to stall open skirmishes that the Gerudo would always win because chasing them across the canyon and into the desert was just too hard. Ganondorf had come to the castle under the pretense of peace and suffered through endless negotiations while he got closer and closer to the Golden Power.

He said the Triforce was in danger. I said that he was the one who wanted it and he couldn't trick me.

He agreed with me on that. He said that he needed it because his people suffered and mine were selfish. But he didn't spend time on that at all. He said that not only did he want it, there was another him that wanted it too. I don't understand what he means but it has something to do with what woke up the warmth or tenderness or whatever this is in him.

I'll try to write what he said down as verbatim as I can remember. It was something like how he had been given the gift of virtue by the wood spirit and that he was growing into a new man. How he felt powers working within him that were bringing to him a new clarity of mind, and how he could feel something he described as a fiery knot growing stout in his breast: a mighty thing that sank and swelled and burst with powerful, overt emotions. Normal people call that a heart, I told him. It only made his gaze keener on me.

But there was also something about destiny. About how when there's a fixed destiny it can't be rewritten even if the people who must fulfill it grow and deepen and learn and change in ways the destiny didn't account for. And how by destiny his hatred was supposed to get worse and worse and now it had to do so even if it wasn't inside him.

I think. It was weird. I don't know how a tree could put so much goodness in him that it would cut him in half. Or was there goodness in him all along and the tree just woke it up and made it grow, like trees do to their roots in the spring? There's still a terrible intensity in his eyes, but it's gotten tempered with a fierce, protective compassion that I can't explain very well.

But if that hate, how he was before, couldn't live inside of him it had to leave and find somewhere else to get stronger, so there are really two of him running around. The one I know has the body and the bad him is just a spirit or something like that but that's even more dangerous because it can go anywhere it wants and won't get stopped by anything the Royal Family can do. We can't try to arrest it, send an army, put out a notice or a bounty, or anything. All we can do is wait for it to strike, and we don't know how it will do that or from where.

It's scary. I thought an evil Ganondorf I could see was frightening, but one I can't see is even worse.

And that was why he needs my help, he said. The Triforce is in danger and he's like me: nobody will ever believe him. The bad him can't get to the sacred realm without a body to open it and that body needs the keys to the Temple of Time. The King isn't going to keep the keys safe, so Ganondorf needs somebody with the power of the royal family who's not the King to guard the ocarina. Ganondorf can't play it, he said, but if the evil him finds a body of somebody who can we'll be in big trouble.

But he's like me. I don't know how that's possible.

I asked him what he would do if I didn't help him. He said that he'd tell my father and my tutors that I went into the library at night, and that he would make sure I was watched at all times and that I would never sneak out to play ever again.

I said that I didn't care and I couldn't risk that he was lying and I wouldn't give into him. Then he threatened to do just what I thought he would do, kill father and ruin everything himself. When he said it I couldn't tell if he meant it or not. He'd do anything to make me listen to him. Even horrible things the Bad Him would do.

It was important to him that I listen or else, so I had no choice but to agree to his terms.

I need to be sneaky, he said. I have to spy on a lot of people: the people closest to the Sacred Realm. The High Bishop. The court wizards. My father. I told him that he would have to keep a watch on the grown-ups and tell me about them so I can snoop better.

We're really going to try together to keep the Triforce safe. Even if Ganondorf wants it for himself, he doesn't want the other him to get it. He can't double-cross me because of that, I think. He'd never do anything that doesn't help himself. He's too tricky for that.

I told Impa about this and asked her to keep it a secret. She's the only other one who believes me and she told me to be careful but she thought that I did the right thing.

I don't know. But I don't think he's lying. Just to see what he would do I told him that if he kept his word when all of this was over I'd make father give the Gerudo a whole chunk of Hyrule field by the lake that nobody even uses; the Zora don't like traffic through there to Castle Town because roads muddy the water, and arguing with Zora makes them want to cut off the river. It should be fine for Gerudo, though.

We're supposed to be a united country, I said. We really have to start acting it.

I think that face he gave me was supposed to be a pleased one. He's very bad at making nice faces.

–

Din 45

Diary,

I haven't written for a long time because I've been really busy. Snooping on everybody is hard work and I haven't had any time to myself. Every day I do all of my lessons and when I have a moment I go and spy on somebody and then in the evening I go to the library and he's waiting there for me. One day I snuck some leftovers from the kitchens and when I got there he took way more than half of them. He just took some! And said that if I brought food I had to be expected to share.

What a pig.

But that's not the reason I'm writing today, Diary. Two days ago, I finally figured out what the light from the forest meant. It went like this:

Ganondorf had another audience with my father today and Ganondorf had been worried about it because the negotiations were not going anywhere and his excuses to stay at the castle might dwindle if the meetings went badly. I wasn't allowed to go, so I told him that I would watch from the window in the courtyard; if he got angry I could just wave to him so he wouldn't become too mad and make things get worse. It sounds a bit silly, but really it's all I can do. Politics just aren't appropriate for a princess, which is really ironic. If it was the Zoras or the Gorons, Scribe Gaebora would make me attend as part of my lessons. Because it was Ganondorf, he didn't let me anywhere near the audience.

It's a good thing that father can't see the east window from his throne, and he never leaves his throne when he talks to Ganondorf. The guards can't see through it either-- too much glare from the stained glass above them. But from where he stood in there (Why can't people just sit? Etiquette can be silly.) Ganondorf could see me just fine if he looked.

Today was special though. Today I met Link.

Link is a boy from the forest, and he came with a fairy just like in my dream. And he also has the Spiritual Stone. So he is definitely the light in my dream. It's weird, but I think I've heard his name before. I don't know how that could be-- I just met him. That also sort of happened with Ganondorf, but I was too scared when I first met him to really pay attention.

But he managed to sneak in past all of father's guards and past the gates. I don't know how he did it-- if there was ever a siege we might be in trouble because if we can't keep out a child my age we're really slipping.

He's very polite and earnest and grown-up for a boy. Not like some of the rude boys I meet sometimes in the square. He has a quiet voice, but maybe he was just shy because I'm the Princess. I sort of hate that.

I told him everything. He said that the Deku Tree had died and had come to him in a dream to do this, and he told me about Ganondorf's appearance in the forest and the nasty Ganondorf Demon (Ganondemon? Ganon-Demon? Maybe just Ganon?) that had tried to hurt his best friend and how it was Ganondorf who actually beat it back for the moment. The story matched up with Ganondorf's story. Also that it was Ganondorf who had said almost the same thing the Deku Tree had said: take the spiritual stone to the castle.

Maybe there is something to this idea of fate after all. It all matches up with what Ganondorf said, and it's not kind of conspiracy at all. Everything that man said to me feels so much more honest now. I really can trust Ganondorf! Diary, Link really is the light from my dream!

Which is why Link agreed with me: he already knew the truth even before we met. I let him spy through the window with me. The meeting was very heated, but neither side was winning the debate, so Ganondorf eventually looked through the window for me. He couldn't let on that there was somebody there, but his sharp eyes did soften somehow when he saw us.

I spent the rest of the afternoon with Link, talking to him about things in the castle and asking him what the forest was like. I think we'll be good friends. A guard came in to check on us but Impa saved the day by saying that I was having a parlay with a Korkirish emissary and that the guard was barging in on our privacy.

Ganondorf found us afterward, appearing with magic in the courtyard and giving Impa a scare. Beyond that, the two were on neutral terms: Gerudo and Sheikah don't usually bother one another, and there's nothing bad between them. He reported that he would be able to stay for a while longer yet, and that for now, he was locked in a stalemate.

We told him what our plan was and after a short debate he grudgingly agreed, but he didn't like it. Although he wanted to send a company of gerudo after the stones, that would attract too much attention both from the King and from the Evil Ganon. He will simply have to help from where he is: in the way of the diplomat and not of the commander.

I have faith in Link. He knows what he's doing. The Demon will expect grown-ups and brute force because that is what Ganondorf though of first, too. But it's like this castle: an army would never be able to storm it, but somebody by himself can sneak in. In the end both of them, Impa and Ganondorf, agreed with us. Sometimes, grown-ups can make things too complicated. Unrelated, it's kind of nice to be listened to.

Impa taught Link the song that would make people take him seriously as my messenger. I also wrote him a special letter that might help him make other people believe him. Ganondorf knows the song too now, although he assures me he cannot sing and has no musical aptitude. I wonder if that's true, or if he's too embarrassed to admit things-- singing is not particularly manly, after all. Maybe he knows how to play some other instrument; he reads poetry as if it was music. But whether he can sing or not, he's not officially our ally and Link isn't either, so what we just did was technically high treason.

If father finds out, I'm in big trouble.

Earlier this evening, after Link left, I met with Ganondorf again. He's almost... scared. I think Ganon is getting closer. Or he's lost its position and he's wary of some kind of surprise attack. He's afraid of himself, and I don't blame him. He was pretty awful, after all.

He offered again to teach me some basic magic techniques, saying that _something _ under the evil would eventually become wise to us and try to cut our plan off at the source. This time, I accepted. I know that his magic is dark and terrible, but I'm justified, I swear. His motives changing aside, he could never be as masterful as he is if he was not an expert at the basics and normal know-how, too. And I've already studied all of the theory in the library, so he won't even have to give the long long lectures about safety and how not to blow oneself up by accident. I just have nobody to teach me the application-- the books are vague on purpose. The Mages' Guild wants to keep knowledge out of the hands of everybody but themselves.

He gave me my first lesson today. It was very difficult and frustrating. Just when I think I can feel the magic, it flutters away out of my hands. The books make it sound so simple, and Ganondorf makes it look so easy. It had to be at least a hundred tries, but I finally managed to conjure a little wisp of smoke. Not even a flame. Not even light. Not even raw energy. Just a piddly little puff of smoke or cloud. I feel so stupid. How could I have believed that I would learn magic and be good at it and that would be that? I spent all that time breaking the rules and learning the description of techniques for nothing? None of it does anything!

My failure aside, Ganondorf is not built for making an astonished face. He said that it was amazing that I was even able to touch on the first day of trying. I don't want to make stupid wispy smoke. He also said I was being greedy and was going to blow myself up with that mindset, but I don't want to even go into that irony. This is his advice for further practice until tomorrow: I have to stop thinking about reaching and just reach. The complexity of it will happen later.

Whatever that is supposed to mean. It's so late. I need to sleep or I'll never wake up in the morning. Goodnight.

–

Din 46

Smoke all evening.

–

Din 47

I hate smoke.

–

Din 48

I hate Ganondorf.  
**You do not.**

–

Din 49

Too tired to write. Smoke.  
Stay out of my diary, Ganondorf. How did you find this anyway?

–

**I am not called King of Thieves for nothing, Princess. As an aside, you write astonishingly well for being only twelve years old.**

Din 50

I still hate you.

–  
Din 51

More smoke. I hate this. I wish he would die.

–

(an unreadable scribble and a blotch of ink)

–

(this page is singed badly)

–

Nayru 2

I made fire today. Reading the past entries, I feel a little silly. But Ganondorf has to go back to the desert tomorrow-- father is making him leave. Ganondorf says that he will be watching, though. He's worried.

But I'm brave and Impa and I will keep the ocarina safe. What he has to do now is go back and win his own people's favor again, so that if something happens they'll listen to him and believe what he says.

Even though he's their king, I think that a lot of his own people don't like him. I don't blame them-- he really was a demon, if the stories I hear from the politicians are true. Even if he never hurt _them_, I looked him up in the records for the Fierce War. In them he was a complete monster. What they think of him needs to be fixed right away.

I hope it won't be too hard. On one hand, he looks better and more and more like a good king every day. On the other hand, he spent however old he is being a bad king. But really, doesn't anybody know his real age? I thought he was forty, but now I'm not so sure. He looked forty a month ago. Two weeks ago, he seemed thirty. Now I can't guess how old he might be anymore other than my father now seems ancient in comparison. He's just so big it's hard to tell. Only when he does bend down to talk to me that I notice that his hair seems thicker and his face less sunken than before. I normally can't see it; I'm not tall enough. But if he looked older than he really is, and now he is looking a lot less old, how young is he really? Who was I scared of before, anyway?

But that's getting away from things. I'm brave and Impa is strong, and we'll never stop watching. Nobody will get close to the Ocarina. I won't let them.

He gave me a present because he's leaving-- his own long knife. It's more like a sabre to me. He showed me how to belt it to my leg under my skirts (a little embarrassing, but he was businesslike) so it won't slip and I so I can sneak it around inside my dress.

Keep a good watch. If you notice anything, feel for this blade and do not be shy to flee.

That's what he said. He also gave me a hug good-bye. It was very strange. I'm sure he did it for me and not for him. I don't think he really wanted to, but maybe he felt he had to because I'm small and he was leaving me all alone. Either way, he is very big and warm. Even if he is rude and a bit cruel in humor, I really like him now. I hope he doesn't have to go for too long. I don't know if he meant it for real, but his arms felt... nice. I can't wait until he comes back.

In other news, the gorons sent a message thanking us for the help with the dodongos that we didn't officially give, which royally confused my father. This happened a little while ago-- just about the time Link ran up Death Mountain, I think. Link's won one more stone key, I'm sure of it. I can only hope that he's quick with the last one and that he gets back in time so we can get the triforce as fast as possible. It's too quiet here without Ganondorf around.

–

Nayru 5

Ocarina is still safe. No word from anybody.

–

Nayru 7

Ocarina not safe. Impa came to me last night and gave it to me and told me to guard it with my life. Today there was a trial and she was found guilty of stealing it and she's to be imprisoned in the Shadow Temple for her crime. She turned herself in so nobody would suffer in Kakariko if they decided to flush her out.

I've heard how horrible the Shadow Temple is. ~there are tearstains here~ She doesn't deserve it. I'll pray for her tonight.

She must have caught somebody trying to take it, so she took it first. But whoever it was, I'll never know because they alerted the guards and reassigned the blame on Impa. I keep the ocarina in my bodice: the last place the palace guards will ever check. I won't let her sacrifice be in vain.

I'm all alone now.

I want to run away, but I can't. I need to wait for Link. I even left a message in the ocarina for him, a magic one I just learned how to make. Just in case I have to hide it for him, if something happens. Nobody else but Link will see the message-- unless they have a fairy with them. If he knows I'm dead, he'll go find Ganondorf and they'll open the Sacred Realm without me.

I'm scared.

–

Nayru 8

Nothing yet. Father is ill and in bed. I wish I knew what to do.

–

Nayru 9

Still nothing. I can light a candle across a room.

I miss Ganondorf. He would know what to do.

–

Nayru 10

Tonight I'm going to bed with Ganondorf's knife. Just in case. Maybe it'll make me feel better.

--

Nayru 11

Did not go to bed last night-- found myself practicing with the knife in the dungeons. If I try to remember to cut the shins and legs, a man can't chase me.

Father still ill. Will sleep tonight with knife.

–

Nayru 12

Tod,--~-..

~This is the final entry in the binding.~


	4. Courage

**Part III: Courage.  
–**

Navi, I need to talk to you. I know you just saw that. Zelda left that message in the ocarina. I have to go to the Temple of Time. Come on.

_The city's burning! You'll get hurt!_

If I don't go, things are just going to get worse. I have to get the Triforce so the Demon can't.

_Well, all right. But be extra careful._

----

I feel weird in my head, Navi.

_What do you mean?_

Have seven years really passed? I'm thinking... strangely.

I don't get what you mean.

Is this what being a grown-up feels like? I can't explain it. My head feels more... serious. No, that's not the right word for it. I don't know.

_The Light Sage told me that your mind has already done a bit of growing up. You just can't remember it yet._

Huh?

_Well, you can travel through time, so maybe you go back in time again and grow up more there later. Except it's really earlier so even though you haven't done it yet it's already happened and..._

Forget I asked.

?!

What happened to Castle Town?! It's... are these...?!

No!

–---

_I opened the door and pulled the sword and then...?_

_He got in! He was there all along, waiting for me!_

_And Ganondorf was there too, and they were fighting, and then The Triforce, I think. And then... then... seven years..._

–---

"There you are, Hero of Time."

How do you know me?

"Your legend's known among the soothsayers. In the darkest hour, the Sacred Realm will call out to the new sages of this land.

One from the deep forest,

One from the high mountains,

One under the cold lake,

One within the ghost's house,

One within our own Sand Goddess.

That's your legend. I've come to make sure you see it through."

_Link! She's a gerudo, one of the desert folk. They're all really tough... maybe you should listen._

Shh, Navi. Look, Gerudo, I don't know about any of that. Who are YOU?

"I'm Sheik of the Gerudo. Don't look at me like that; I was named for a Sheikah's sacrifice for my people. They've been completely wiped out now."

What?! Not only Castle Town?!

"The entire world has gone to ruin, Hero. Huh, you do really look like the Hero standing there with the Master Sword like that. Put it away; I'm not going to fight you."

Then why did you come after me?

"To tell you that legend. I have a gift of Sight-- I saw your return. I need to tell you; one of the sages is already waiting for you in the Forest Temple. She's a girl I think you know. But the evil power that's gotten into the Sacred Realm's keeping her from fighting back the darkness..."

_She must be talking about Saria!_

"If that's her name, Fairy. But I know for a fact that you can't get into the temple at all right now-- it's too high from the ground."

Then how?

"How should I know? Go see if anybody in Kakariko can help you; they might have some tinkering or another. Eh? - I need to go. My King is calling me; I need to tell him the news."

Wait!

"Hero, don't die too soon! We'll meet again."

?!

Navi?! Where did she go?! She's... gone!

_Magic! She must have used sorcery to blink away!_

That's no fair. Huh, to Kakariko it is. I think the ranch is on the way-- we can check on Malon, too. I hope she's all right...

–--

It's you!

"Are you surprised to see me? I don't like the forest so much, but my King said I had to help Saria if she was in danger. So have you found a way in there yet?"

I have a hookshot, I guess. Wait, is Ganondorf still king of the Gerudo?

"We only have one king every hundred years. Of course he is!"

_Thank goodness he's still alive. Maybe we can go see him later._

Wait, can't you just... vanish up there?

"Yes. But it's your destiny, and you can't vanish. Mucking around with destiny is dangerous. Sometimes it works out all right, but more often than not it makes things even worse than before."

Okay.

"Listen, I'll go on ahead and meet you inside. But before then, I've got something to say to you, kid."

What?

"Words of the Sight. The flow of time's the cruelest power you can wield. Although you seem stronger, who's to say what's really changed in this world? The only thing that doesn't change is a memory. Remember that. It'll ease your pain later."

I don't understand.

"Just a warning. A prophecy, if you want to call it that. What you encounter may be exactly what you expect. But you're the Hero of Time. Nothing is for you as it's for everybody else in this world. The only things left of your old life someday may be what you remember. Learn to let go."

But how will you get in without

"Locks are no obstacle for me, Hero."

?!

_She vanished again!_

I think I hate it when she does that.

---

So that's what you meant. Saria's... gone. She's only in the past now.

"My king won't be pleased, but at least she's still around after death. She's a sage. She's with you forever."

Your king?! Saria was my friend! My best one! My only one! How can you talk about your king at a time like this?!

"My king is my father, and the girl once did him a great service! She's worthy of great respect!"

I know. I was there.

"I know you were. I Saw it."

How?!

"I'm a seer. I happen to See many things. Ever since The Great Ganondorf exiled the sorcerous Twinrova sisters, I have trained to take their place."

_Link... I hate to interrupt you. I know you're in a lot of pain... Saria was my friend too. But if we're ever going to put things right, we have to go on. I think... I think the next place we have to go is Death Mountain. If Saria was in trouble, who knows what happened to the Gorons? _

We'll go. We have to. There's no going back now. Well, to Death Mountain. Are you going to be coming with us, Sheik?

"No. I have to go back and relay the news, however sad it is. I'll meet you there later. I have duties I need to attend to."

We'll see you then.

"It's pretty obvious, but death mountain's gotten hotter. You'd better be careful. Don't die, Hero."

_And she's gone again. I should just stop saying when she leaves. Does it make you feel as stupid as it makes me feel?_

Yeah. But she can't help it. She's got a whole people to worry about her. I just have Saria... and now I don't even have her anymore, either.

_It's not like you to be like this, Link. You've got me, too._

You're right. We need to go. There's no point staying here any longer.

–---

You didn't tell me what happened to the Gorons.

"It didn't happen until after you went into the first temple. Ganon's noticed you. He's moving again."

You also weren't joking when you said it was hot.

"I don't usually joke when lava is involved. There are very few places that are hotter than the desert at noon, and this place is one of them."

Are we going to go in?

"Yeah. But listen to me."

I'm listening.

"Ganon is trying to break the people of this world because he cannot crush us directly. In a way, he's right to do so. The old will fall to the new. The things we build will eventually break. That's time's cruelest law. You know that by now, hm?"

It doesn't justify what he's done.

"Of course not. But the Gorons were a people even older than mine, each one with the strength to topple two horses. And they fell. Bear that in mind."

Why do you tell me these things?

"You weren't here to see it happen, ever so slowly. Your mind needs to think, to catch up. This isn't any place for a child, and you aren't one anymore in body. Just like everything else, you need building."

So I can fall, like the Gorons?

"No. Physical things we build won't endure the ages, but for all our lives the bonds we forge with others will never be broken. It's the source of hurt when-- damn these keese!-- we think they're severed. They never will be."

If you're trying to make me feel better, you're doing a rotten job at it.

"Mm, I know. Maybe I should quit while I'm ahead, yeah?"

Yeah, you should.

–--

_ Sheik, you don't swim, do you?_

"I'm sorry, but I can't help you with this next one. I don't swim."

Why not?

"Do you know very many places to learn how to swim in the desert, Hero?"

Oh. I guess not. Can I ask you a favor, then?

"Name it."

Can you try and free more of the Zora? I'm going to free the king, but I don't have the sorcery to get to the ones beneath the ice...

"Once the Water Temple is saved, then the ice should clear. But yes, I will do that for you. I managed to save the Zora Princess before, but there are others I can reach. She left to the Water temple."

Thank you. I wish I didn't have to deal with Ruto, though... she's um

"You're going to have to get to Lake Hylia from here... it shouldn't be too difficult. You have a swift horse. I'll find you when you've succeeded, Hero."

The temple really is at the bottom of the lake. I saw it before but I never thought

"Be careful. Water is treacherous, even more treacherous than fire. It can crush, it can choke, it can even rip and tear. It's always changing, even when it doesn't seem dangerous at first. As time passes, there's always water. But just like people can change, water's dynamic. Be on your guard, Hero."

If I didn't know better, I'd say you're afraid.

...

That's right. Run away, with your cryptic prophet words. She didn't even hear me.

_She's just concerned for you. You're not going to have any help on this next one. Other than me, anyway, and I can't hold a sword._

Navi?

_Yes?_

Do you think she likes me?

_I don't know. She definitely wants you alive._

But is she talking about me? Or is she talking about how I'm the Hero?

_I don't know. Sorry._

It's all right. You can't really know. I don't understand the way she acts. I wish she would stay longer when we aren't saving Gorons or something.

_She has a lot of things to do._

…

…

She's kind of pretty, though.

_...HA! You like her, don't you?_

What? No! I mean...

She's just pretty. That's all.

–--

"Link! You did it! The water's come back!"

Well, it wasn't easy. I could have used your help...

"Nothing personal, but... Like I said, I can't swim very well."

Ruto wanted to thank you.

"Tell her it was no trouble."

I can't. She's... she's gone.

"Speak up, I can't hear you, Hero."

The monster ate her. She became a Sage. Well, she wanted to marry me, but still. I shouldn't be relieved. She's dead.

_At least she can help now. It's the way she'd want it to be._

"Shame. The Zora are saved, but we must move on. Come, we must go. My King wishes to meet you. We have a ride ahead of us.

No magic?

"Why? Are you in a hurry?"

I guess not.

–--

…

Sheik! The smoke! There's so much of it.

"I see it too... no! That's from the village!"

Kakariko? Why would

"We've spent so long keeping it safe! Damn him-- he's broken through! Come on, Hero! We must ride!"

What?! What could have happened there?!

"The Sheikah bound many evil spirits in those hills, to keep safe the rest of this land. The one who named me was said to have sealed a demon in the bottom of the well in the Fierce War... I can feel it! It's broken free!"

What about the people?!

"Everybody's in danger, Hero! Now's not the time for soft paces."

–--

"Link! Stay back!"

We'll face it together!

"What--?! NO!"

_What is it?! I can't... see...!_

SHEIK! No! Get up! Are you...?!

"I'm... I'm all right. Just, get out of here. Get our King. He can subdue it-- What are you doing?! No!"

I won't leave you here. I will defend you.

"No! You can't see--"

_Link! Look out!_

?!----...

…

–--

Unnngg...

"Praise the goddess, you're all right. You took a beating, but looks like you'll be fine."

What... what WAS that?!

"It was a terrible spirit, like I told you before. It was sealed at the bottom of the well, but Ganon's power has set it free again. It headed for the Shadow Temple..."

We need to go after it... Where is the temple?

"Hold on; take it easy. At least rest a little. You can't get in, anyway."

But I need-- ungh!

"Whoops. Here. Against this tree. I'll start binding that."

Thank you... but why can't we get in?

"The way is shut by Sheikah spirits, invisible to all who don't see past illusions as they do. One of those spirits is the one I owe my life to."

The one who named you.

"Yeah. Her ghost guards that nasty place now."

Is there any other way to get in? We need to.

"Yes, but not anymore. There used to be an artifact that revealed the Sheikah ways, but it's been long destroyed. My King reclaimed it himself from the bottom of the well, five years ago when this horror first tried to break loose. The monster smashed it-- I've seen the shards. It's broken. Even the Great Ganondorf cannot find the entrance to the Shadow Temple without the Eye of Truth."

…

Maybe not.

_What do you mean?_

I can go through time. Seven years ago, it wasn't broken. Seven years ago, the monster or ghost or whatever it is, it wasn't awake yet. Maybe I can take the thing down there so it never gets broken in the first place. Then we can use it to fix this disaster.

"Changing fate is dangerous."

I don't care. It's the only way.

"Then I can't stop you, huh? Fine. The way to get back through time again is to replace the Master Sword into the pedestal at the Temple of Time. Your mind will be sent back seven years to the point at which you fell asleep. Be careful-- Castle Town will still be burning. You'll need to come here and figure out a way to drain the well... my King blasted the water away, but you'll have to do something else."

I'm ready for anything-- ow!

_Link, you need to rest for a little while. You'll hurt yourself moving in this condition._

"Yeah. Take it easy on your way there, kid. I don't want to see you hurt for real. I'll be waiting here for when you return with the Eye of Truth."

You be careful, too.

–--

This feels so weird. I thought it would be like going back to being a kid, but... I'm just stuck in my old body like this... I feel short.

_I guess you really grew into being big._

–--

I feel bad. Now they have to get a new well.

_They dig a new one in the mountain, remember. It's okay._

But still. I just wrecked this one.

_Soon evil things and nasty icky spirits will be coming out of this one. Do you really think anybody wants to drink that?_

I guess not... ew. There's... a dead...

And another one... How many people died down here?! What kind of place is this?

_An evil one._

–--

There. This must be it. Ugh, that thing was...

_Gross? Disgusting?_

Awful. But what now? When Ganondorf comes to get back this thing he won't find it because I have it instead.

_ I know! Let's leave him a note that he'll find. That way, he'll know that we've been here._

Okay. But all I have for paper is the back of this... Zelda gave me this letter. Oh well. It'll have to work.

–--

"What in hell is THAT, Hero?"

This? Um, Sheik, I just showed you-- this is the Lens of Truth and

"No, that! There's a piece of paper tacked over the door there. What is it? It looks old."

… Huh? I left this down the well seven years ago... No, there's something else here. I can't believe it!

_**Clever, kid. **_

He wrote back!

"What?! My king never found a note at the bottom of-- wait? What am I remembering? Of course he did... but he actually wrote back to you?"

Don't worry, it hurts my head, too. Let's go. We'll go to see him together after we do this. Right now we have to beat that evil ghost.

"When did you get so grown-up?"

I really don't know.

–--

That was Impa! That was her ghost!

"How do you know her?"

Impa was the princess's handmaiden. What did she do to name you?

"She sacrificed her own life to save the Ocarina of Time. If she had not done so, Ganon would have gotten it and killed my King. I didn't have a name at the time; I was little, then. The Great Ganondorf named me in honor of her. In a way, I owe her my life, too. Without our King, we all would have perished from the start."

Impa is a sage... we only have one more to go. Then we can have the power to seal Ganon away, right?

"Yeah. Link, my King is abroad in the desert investigating a crime amongst our people, but he'll be back at our fortress again soon. I will go find him and give him the news. You go on ahead to the fortress. I have sent word. Unless there's been a serious mistake, they will not attack you."

How do I get there?

"The pass to the river canyon is to the west. From there, the paths should be obvious. Find a crossing, and if you can, introduce yourself. They should know you are coming. If the bridges are out, there's a point west and slightly south of Lon Lon ranch that the river canyon is close enough to jump with a mighty horse. Yours has proven herself to be one, but... still, be careful if that is the way you take."

Thanks.

"Our king would hate to see you a flattened smear on the riverbed, Hero. Just remember that, yeah?"

–--

That didn't go well.

_Understatement, Link._

That REALLY did not go well. Ow. I mean, I could have fought but...

_But Sheik said that they would be waiting for us! Why don't they know?_

Maybe the message didn't get through. So we really only have to wait in here until Sheik gets back with her King, and then it will all be worked out...?

_Link, I don't know. Erm, I don't know how to say this, but... I know they have their King but..._

But what?

_If you wait here too long they might want you to... um... father children for them._

…

_Link! You're blushing!_

I'm sorry! Are you... are you serious?! I don't want... really...

Ugh. We have to get out... Luckily, they didn't take anything out of my hat. I need to get my sword back, and then I can escape.

There's an open window up there.

–--

Navi! Get back here! They'll see you--?

_Eeek!_

!

NAVI!

Put her down and come out! I'll fight you for

for

…

**"It's been a while, boy."**

It's you! (Huh... he hasn't aged a bit... I don't get it. I'm bigger now but he still seems the same amount bigger than I am... even if not for real...)

_It's Ganondorf!_

**"It is. Ha-- you should bow to a King, lad. I see you haven't changed."**

Please put Navi down, King Ganondorf... she might get hurt...

**"As you wish. I'm not familiar with the vulnerabilities of fairies. At ease, my sisters. This boy is a valuable ally."**

_ Phew! You really scared me! Nobody's ever caught me before..._

Sheik said you wanted to see me. Where is she?

** "She was correct, and she will join us shortly, provided everything proceeds normally. She must finish her duties before meeting us. But come. Enough of this hallway chatter. We'll speak in private at greater length."**

**"But first... how by the Gods did you manage to walk through without an escort?**

Ha... funny story... that...

–--

**"You will not be able to enter the temple as it is. The way inside is blocked. The Spirit Temple used to be a holy place of ours, a birthing place and a place of trials. It is our proof of existence in Hyrule, that we are a part of it. It's now become a refuge of traitors and connivers."**

What happened there?

**"Years ago, I exiled the Twinrova sisters. They were sorceresses of formidable power, and their intentions only lay in manipulating me. I did not foresee them, in the chaos of Hyrule's fall, to seize the Temple as their base of operations. Even I cannot force them out alone, and our efforts are divided between keeping safe Kakariko and other more fortunate villages, and holding back an attack from our own temple."**

This isn't on the topic but, I have to know-- what happened to Zelda? Where is she?

**"Zelda is safe. She is in hiding. When the time's right she'll probably appear."**

Huh.

**"Do not concern yourself with her. She is well-hidden. Now, as for your role in all of this..."**

What do you mean?

**"You're the Hero of Time, if your stunt at the bottom of Kakariko's well is any proof. It is possible to change the past, if you go back and alter events. "**

So when do you want me to go?

**"Seven years ago, not long after I returned, my most trusted lieutenant pursued the witches to the Spirit Temple, but after that, was lost. Not long after, the temple was taken before any of us could turn our attentions from Ganon's razing of Hyrule. I want you to go back these seven years and find out what happened on that day when Nabooru disappeared. If possible, aid her so I do not lose her. Every one of my sisters is valuable to me."**

Okay. I'll do it.

**"You will need to go to the Spirit Temple through the desert first. I will meet you there."**

What? To go back in time I need to go to the

**"You will never be able to make the journey as a child. Once you have made your way there, I will meet you at the entrance. Then I will explain more."**

Fine then.

**"The desert is treacherous. Remember that."**

Why do I have this sinking feeling?

**"Don't complain."**

–--

He wasn't kidding. I can't see. Ow! This sand! I might as well pull my hat over my eyes!

There's nothing here! Navi!

_I can't hear you, Link! The wind is too loud!_

Just great... I don't know how much of this I can take... I've been going in circles!

Is that a... a light? Sheik?

… ?

–--

Here... here I am. I made it. I have sand in places that should never have sand but... hey! Stop laughing! It's not funny!

** "I beg to differ! You do realize that you're in the desert?"**

I never would have guessed. I'm definitely not thirsty enough to drink mud, and there is definitely not sand in my eyeballs. No, never. This is a complete surprise to me, Your Majesty.

** "I see you've grown a taste for sarcasm. I was beginning to think you were a lost cause. No, you did well, boy. Few have made such a good time to this temple. Here, we may rest a while. They'd be fool to jump the both of us here."**

So, what's your plan? And where's Sheik?

_Link, you really should be more polite... He'll be offended..._

** "Don't put words in my mouth, fairy. Brevity will do here perfectly well, and I cannot expect anything less than ill humor after a death march through perhaps the most unforgiving stretch of my lands."**

The most--?! Why?! Couldn't you just have vanished me out here?!

** "The harsh path is a test, in a way. All of my people make it when they come of age. You would not have been permitted inside the Spirit Temple if you had not conquered it. And you must enter it in order to proceed."**

Oh. So... again. What's the plan and where is Sheik?

**"Sheik is drawing away Ganon's eye. It is risky, but she is skilled-- a diversion of illusions is enough. Ganon's paranoia has been heightened lately. Because of this, we may converse here without fear of his long sight."**

Will she be okay?

**"She is the most skilled seer we have known in two centuries, rivaling Twinrova easily. She is more than competent in sorcery and at the sword. I have complete faith in her ability to serve me. She has done well so far.**

You're her father, right?

**"I am, but that is unimportant. You must travel to the past and return here. The Master Sword should know how far to take you. Once in the past, use this. **

…? Paper?

**It is a spell that will bring you here once, and return you once. No more. But that is all you will need.**

Okay. Go back. Come here. Investigate. Got it.

**Good. There's no hurry. At least, not in this time. **

And he left... wait. This magic goes from the temple of Time to here, and back, not the other way around... how am I supposed--?!

Navi! Navi, wake up!

_Ohh... Link, hello...? Is the sandstorm over?_

Navi, how do I get back through the desert? This spell takes me from the Temple of Time to here, and then puts me back there once. I can't use it to...?

_I don't think so. You'll have to go back the way you came._

… Navi, he's trying to kill me.

_I'm sure he just means to test your strength._

Well, he might as well just summon up some lightning and get the killing over with. If sending me back through that deathtrap isn't murder, I don't know what is.

_He is a mostly nice person, Link. Don't complain. He could have been much worse than he already is._

If this is nice, I don't want to see him mean.

_Me neither._

–--

"Who are you, little boy? And what are you doing in this place? And how did you get through the desert, anyway?"

I'm Link, and this is my fairy Navi. The rest isn't really important. Are you Nabooru...? Um, could you please stop pointing that at me?

"This must be a trick. There's no way... Yes, that's my name. What is it to you, kid?"

_So it is her!_

King Ganondorf sent me to help you.

"What?! My king sends a... a... sprout?! That can't be true-- He's changed, but... it doesn't make any sense!"

It's really complicated and I'd probably explain it completely wrong. But just trust me, something horrible is going to happen if I'm not here to help you today.

"You're serious."

I don't joke about things like that.

"You're not lying. But I don't see how you can help me, little boy."

I'm not really a little boy anymore. I've fought giant monsters, evil spirits, everything. I can beat anybody with a sword, I promise.

_It's true! He's beaten dodongos and parasites and demons and dragons and ghosts... everything!_

"Oh ho ho! I don't know if I can believe that, kid. But if Ganondorf believes you can help, then I'll trust you. For now. Come, walk with me, and keep that sword out. The Twinrova sisters could come and curse you at any time."

Okay. So, can you tell me what's going on here?

"I'm investigating this temple. The Twinrova sisters reportedly fled here after Ganondorf tried to make them answer for their crimes. The nerve! Defiling this place..."

Who's Twinrova?

"Kotake and Koume are two ancient sisters, powerful sorceresses and seers. They raised our king, taught him magical arts, and they were content with him until his power and knowledge began to surpass theirs. They turned to dark arts to stay one step ahead of him, and he followed. All of them were consumed by that awful magic. Or, at least until recently."

What do you mean?

"You've met our king, if you're not lying about who sent you. Maybe you don't know, huh? I'm the only one who's not afraid to say it, but until recently, he was a complete monster. No honor. Greedy. A knot of the most horrible things that war can put into a person.

But a few months ago he came back from his negotiations at the castle a changed man. At first I thought it was some kind of trick, but it's real. I'd severed ties and been on my own after a while, after the war, but he came to me himself and asked me back. I don't know what he did or what somebody else did, or what happened at all, but he's suddenly a good and wise king. I'm not asking any questions, not after such a miracle."

Really? Wow.

"I know, it's more than impossible. But it's true. I've never heard of such a demand for children before. Then again, if I wanted one then I would much rather have it of our king as he is now, than as he was before."

…

"You're blushing! Ha, was I too blunt there?"

I didn't need to know that. Um... er... Wait, Ganondorf exiled his own mothers? That's...

"It needed to be done. They were performing nasty experiments and nobody could stop them. Ganondorf knew all along, but he didn't do anything about it until he suddenly grew a sense of honor. But they escaped his judgment and are said to be hiding in here... we've been too busy guarding refugees and repelling monsters lately to chase them. Only now are we able to get enough of us into a second attack team to bring Twinrova to justice. My king will be here soon. I'm scouting ahead."

I see.

Nabooru, do you know a lot about the people in the fortress?

"Huh? There aren't many of us, so... I would say yes. Why do you want to know, kid?"

Have you ever heard of a little girl named Sheik?

"Nope. Sorry."

_Link, she hasn't been named yet. She said that she was named after something that happened with Impa and maybe it hasn't happened yet._

…

Maybe.

–--

No--!

I don't believe it. I knew we shouldn't have separated! Argh! It's all my fault! If I had just stayed with her instead of crawling to see through that crack then...

_No, Link! Shh! You have to be quiet! They'll take you, too!_

…

They're gone. They got Nabooru. I told Ganondorf I would help, and I failed! What will he say now?

_Don't blame yourself, Link. There was nothing you could have done. The witches would just have killed you._

Exactly!

This body-- This is my real body, my real age! But I hate this, not being able to help. I don't think in the right way for it anymore. Navi, what's happened to me? I feel... too crammed, too much for myself. I don't like it. I just want to be big again, where I can do things and where I can actually help!

_Oh, Link._

Just tell me, Navi.

_You've grown up._

–--

The desert wasn't nearly as bad the second time around. We're here already.

_Link! Slow down! I'm... I'm getting tired. You're going too fast! Did you even feel the desert?_

I don't care, Navi. I need to save Nabooru now, I need to make it up to Ganondorf. We're going in there this time and we're not coming out until we have her. I know she's in there somewhere, I just know.

"Wait, Hero!"

Sheik? What are you doing

"I know what happened on that day seven years ago, when you went back in time to help our Nabooru."

I guessed. You are a seer. But what do you want?

"I am coming in there with you."

What? It's too dangerous--

"For you. This place has changed in seven years. Twinrova's been using it for their black-magic experiments, and using the sands as a cloak to keep our King away. He cannot fight the war on two fronts. I have been training for this moment all of my life. We will drive Twinrova out and defeat them."

… Sheik?

"Yes?"

It doesn't matter what I say, does it? You'll just vanish in there even if I don't want you to.

"That was the general idea, Hero."

So I'll ask you one question. Who are you, really?

Sheik is Sheik. I don't understand the question.

Seven years ago, Nabooru did not know you.

"She wouldn't have. I hadn't taken this name yet."

But Impa was long gone by the time Nabooru was taken. The time doesn't add up.

"Ganondorf hadn't yet given me the name. I hadn't come of age yet."

…

Let's just go.

–--

I should have seen this coming.

"Don't move, Hero. You're burned."

Not badly. No, I should have seen it coming. Who else could be the sage? Everyone I seem to come to know dies this way, and I guess they're helping me. But it's predictably only the people I know, Sheik.

Why can't somebody else die? Why my friends? Did I do something wrong?

"No, no. We must keep moving. You did not do anything wrong."

Then what, Sheik? I'm getting tired of this. None of this should have happened. If only I hadn't made that mistake! Maybe everybody would still be alive...

"Get a hold of yourself, Hero. You know that you're connected to everything. You're the Hero of Time. By fate, you're the key that holds all of this in place. If it's sad that your friends have to die, then that is the way it is."

That's cold.

"Rabbits are hunted, wolves do the hunting. Winds blow, fires burn. This is your role, if you like it or not. Does the world care if the wind doesn't like to blow, or if the wolf doesn't lust for the taste of flesh? Either way, the clouds have to move and one more starved wolf is inconsequential."

I like you better when you're not acting the seer.

"You and me both. But now the Six Sages are reunited in the sacred realm through their new proxies and now we have a means of breaking into Ganon's Castle."

The sages will bring us in?

"Yes. And if we defeat Ganon, Power will pass fully to my King. And we will use it to right all of the wrongs that have been done here."

What?

"You'll understand soon."

Why not now?

"Because I am not going to start explaining the plans of the Goddesses and the divine flaws of the grand scheme when you're such a mess. My King has already left to make preparations. You gather strength, and then set out for the Castle Town Ruins. We'll talk more in the Temple of Time. Meet me there, Hero."

Be careful, Sheik.

You don't need to tell me that. Don't die, Hero. I will see you shortly.

–--

"You're here."

Yes. Now you need to tell me-- how are we going to defeat Ganon?

"I will, Link. But first... I have to apologize to you."

For what?

"Lying to you. Hiding the whole truth."

…

I don't understand, Sheik.

"I will explain-- to defeat Ganon, you need to know the whole truth. And first, you must know the whole story... the story of the Triforce, and what happened on that day when this city burned. It begins with a legend, passed down through the whispers of spirits that I have heard in the seven years of my training...

The Sacred Realm is the fiber of this world closest to the gods, the final veil all of us will pass through. It is a mirror that reflects what is in the heart, speeding us to reincarnation if fate demands it. If dominated by evil hearts and wicked souls, it will become full of malice and ghosts will wander. If left pure, fortune will smile upon these lands.

The Triforce is a balance, Hero. It weighs the heart as the Sacred Realm judges. If the heart of the one who holds the Triforce is in balance, that one will gain the True Force to govern all. But, if not... the Triforce will shatter into its virtues to hide away. If that one's soul is not wholly barren, he will gain the piece that resonates most with his inner being.

And if the interloper wants the True Force, he'll have to find it himself: hidden in the hearts of those chosen by destiny to bear the divine burden. Though they will be marked-- the Triforce comes to bear in their deeds, their actions. Thus it marks upon the hand that it has chosen as a vessel."

And what does this have to do with...?

"You? Link, you haven't realized it by now? You're Courage. You have it."

?!

"It just hasn't resonated. My King's hold over Power is weakened, and I have hid Wisdom. But no longer. Ganon already knows. I should never have followed you, or helped you, but here we are."

Sheik--!

?!

… You?

You're

Zelda?

"Yes. I am."

**AND NOW YOU'RE MINE.**

~?!

–--

What are you doing here?!

** "I don't need to explain myself to you, boy."**

**"The demon has my daughter."**

I thought you said she could take care of herself.

**"She can. She is strong. Ganon is simply stronger."**

Wait... how is she your daughter...? If Sheik is Zelda, and Zelda is the princess of Hyrule and a hylian, then...

** "If I sired her or not is irrelevant. She is my daughter, my apprentice, and the flesh of my soul. I will not allow Ganon to have her. Blood is not the only, or even the strongest tie to kin."**

…

You really love her, don't you?

** "On my honor, I cannot favor one daughter over another, but Zelda holds a sacred place in my heart, boy. She did not place her faith in me for seven hard years for me to abandon her now."**

Ganondorf...?

**"..."**

I can't even begin to understand, really. I've never been good with that sort of thing, with family ties. I never had much of any, aside from Saria. I don't know how to deal with this.

It doesn't matter. Zelda needs to be saved. And both of us are going to go get her, and put an end to Ganon. Saria, Ruto, Darunia, Impa, Nabooru... We'll avenge them.

Let's go. There's no time to waste. Ganon's going to die today.

… what are you looking at?

**"You've come a long way, Link. But you haven't changed as much as you think you have."**

So then it's just like old times, then? How we first met?

**"You shouldn't jest. Its very likely that if things happened differently, it would be me you would be climbing this tower to face. By all rights, you should hate me for unleashing Ganon upon the world."**

It wasn't your fault. Besides, I can't really hate you.

** "Oh?"**

You remind me of the Great Deku Tree. The only father I know, really. I don't know why or how but... You've kind of taken his place...

** "Gods and hellfire. It's impossible."**

What?

** "The Gerudo King has somehow adopted himself a son."**

–--

I can't think anymore.

What is that, Navi?

Is it even...?

_Maybe once. _

It's the King.

And Sheik. Oh gods, poor Sheik.

_Zelda._

They're the same. Ganondorf, look at him-- they look the same, him and the monster, look at their faces, look at that rage. I can't even...?

I owe it to him. It's my fault, all of this. If I hadn't opened the Door of Time, I could have stopped all of this.

The organ stopped.

I think it's time.

–--

Navi, don't OHGODS THE PAIN MAKE IT STOP

**YOU WILL BOW**.

**"I bow to no one. Not even darkness."**

And neither do I!

–--

Sheik! Zelda! We have to run!

Ganondorf!

**"No. Not this time."**

–--

What are you doing?!

"Ganondorf! Please, don't-- Power, don't merge it--! You'll be lost--!"

**"ENd uS, LiNk! Do iT nOw! WItHout mE, he Is imMortAl! SlAy thIs bEasTly foRm!**

"Father!"

**"YoU aRe maSter of yOuR oWn deStiNY, Zelda. I doN't hoLd yOU in my hAnDs any longer~RAAAA I'LL KILL YOU YOU WILL PAY I WILL DEVOUR YOU WHOLE~. Do it! Do it now!"**

"I understand."

…

"But in the next life, remember this. I was your daughter, and I loved you."

…

"Link. We must."

I'm sorry.

--~!! It's done.

**"So am I.**

**… Sages.**

**…Zelda.**

**…Link.**

**So am I."**

He's gone.

"The Sacred Realm has him now. With all of the evil he ever had. And ever could have had."

It's really over.

"It will never be over, Link. We must go back. None of this should have happened. Link, I have one more favor to ask of you."

Anything.

"We need to live out the years you've lost. As they should have been. Before the Deku Tree died. Before everything. We can stop all of this for real. We've ended things in this dark world. We must set things right in our own. Can you do this for me?"

Ganondorf will never

He won't be

"I know. He will never be the man we knew. But for him to be who we loved, primal evil had to have been set free on Hyrule. He told me every day that things would have been better if only he stayed as foul as he began. If we truly want to preserve his memory-- we'll go back. And stop the monster he could have been, before he slays the Deku Tree."

I understand.

You won't remember this journey. I'm sorry. But that's the way it has to be. I've ruined you. As you are, you'll go mad if stuck as a child again. You will remember only that you must find me in the castle when you return. And I'm sorry. I'll tell you everything when you get back."

You will remember?

"I have Wisdom, and I can't ever forget."

So everything we did... it was just... for nothing?

"Maybe on the outside. But... can I tell you something? Something I know?"

A secret? I feel like a kid again already.

"It's knowledge of the gods. Just knowing it might drive you mad."

It's okay. I'll forget in a moment, anyway.

"This whole affair has set in motion a vast cycle, Link. We're bound to these pieces of the Triforce we carry. Until the end of time, our souls will be reborn. There will be many Links and Zeldas after we're gone. But this destiny, it's been disturbed."

What do you mean?

"Link, all of our rebirths are connected. And Ganondorf is just like us: there will be as many hims as stars in the sky, too. And we have introduced one into the mix that carried... I'll say his virtue in a more awakened state. We've planted a seed of light, just as the Great Deku Tree did."

"And maybe someday, there will be a Ganondorf reborn that has a shred of ours left in him. The goodness is sealed with the Evil, and good will triumph in the end. I know it will."

How?

"I know everything, if I want to. And believe me, it's more horrible than you can imagine."

"But that's enough for now, Hero. You've won. You're alive. And now, you'll be able to rest."

"So rest, Hero."

Wait!

When I get back... can you make sure I remember you?

"Maybe."

Thank you. There's... just so much I want to say.

"I know. And I wish things were different. But now there's only one gift I can give you to send you on your way.

My lullaby."


End file.
